How to: Update your Ava Appliance software

Last modified: Thursday November 11, 2021.

Keeping your Ava Appliances and Avigilon Ava cameras up-to-date is important to ensure you have the latest security patches, bug fixes, and new features installed. You can configure Aware to automatically update your Ava Appliances and Avigilon Ava cameras when new versions of software are released. Alternatively, you can manually update the software.

When Avigilon Alta makes new versions of the Aware software available, a banner is displayed on the Dashboard tool for all users with access rights for the Appliances tool. Clicking the banner opens the Appliances tool and the relevant dialog to enable you to update your Avigilon Alta system.

When Avigilon Alta makes new versions of the Aware or Avigilon Ava cameras software available, a banner is displayed on the Dashboard for all users with access rights for the Appliances tool. Clicking the banner opens the relevant dialog to enable you to manually update your Aware video management system.

Prerequisites

Only users with the Administrator role can monitor or manage the Ava Appliances used by your Aware video management system.

Task — Open the Appliances tool

1. Log in to Alta Aware as an Administrator.
2. Click Appliances, or click Add new tool, then select Appliances.

Task — Check the currently installed software version

1. Click the relevant server group.
   The details pane for your selected server group opens.

   Make sure you click the server group:

   Rather than the servers themselves:

2. Scroll down to the FIRMWARE area.
   The currently installed software version is shown. Information about the latest available software version is also shown.
3. Click Done.

Task — Automatically update the software

To ensure that your Avigilon Alta system is up-to-date and running the latest versions of software, configure Automatic updates.

1. Click the server group.
   The details pane for your selected server group opens.
2. Scroll down to the FIRMWARE area.
   The currently installed software version is shown.
3. Click Automatic update.
4. Configure the frequency that your Ava Appliance checks for any updates.
   If newer versions are found, your system updates at the selected time.

   To disable the automatic software updates, select Don't automatically update.

5. Specify the time of day when your system updates.
6. Click Done.
7. Click Done.
8. Click Done.
   When a new Aware software package is available, you will see a banner letting you know, and on the Appliance group settings dialog, Update appears next to the Latest software area.
   Follow the instructions in Task — Manually update the software to the latest version to upgrade the software for both your Avigilon Ava cameras and for Aware.

Task — Manually update the software to the latest version

1. Click the server group.
   The details pane for your selected server group opens.
2. Scroll down to the FIRMWARE area.
   The currently installed software version is shown. Information about the latest available software version is also shown. If a newer version of software is available, the option to Update appears.
3. Click Update.
   You are prompted that this process could take some time to update the software across all servers in the server group, and that you must not turn off any server in that time.
4. Click Update to continue.
5. Click Done.
   The software is updated on all Ava Appliances in the selected server group.
   You can see the progress of the update as it initially downloads the files, then carries out the upgrade. When the upgrade is complete, the Ava Appliance reboots.

   If there is more than one server in your server group, the aggregated progress for the server group is displayed, not the progress for individual servers.

Task — Replace the software with another version

In some circumstances, you might be advised by your Avigilon Alta technical support representative to replace your currently installed software with a version other than the latest. If this is the case, they will provide you with the relevant software update files and password. Use this task to replace the software.

1. Click the server group.
   The details pane for your selected server group opens.
2. Scroll down to the FIRMWARE area.
   The currently installed software version is shown.
3. Click Replace with another version.
4. Select the required software version.
5. Enter the provided password.
   
6. Click Replace to continue.
   The software is updated on all Ava Appliances in the selected server group.
7. Click Update to continue.
8. Click Done.
   The software is updated on all Ava Appliances in the selected server group.
   You can see the progress of the update as it initially downloads the files, then carries out the upgrade. When the upgrade is complete, the Ava Appliance reboots.

   If there is more than one server in your server group, the aggregated progress for the server group is displayed, not the progress for individual servers.

Task — Select the Upgrade channel for your Ava Appliance

When enabled by your Avigilon Alta partner, you can choose to have your Ava Appliance update from either the Beta upgrade channel, or from the Stable upgrade channel.

The Beta upgrade channel hosts the latest features for your Alta video security systems. However, these features might not be fully functioning, and might require further testing. The Stable upgrade channel has the current fully-tested version of the software.

1. Click the relevant server group.
   The details pane for your selected server group opens.
2. Scroll down to the FIRMWARE area.
3. If enabled by your Avigilon Alta partner, select your preferred Upgrade channel, either Beta, or Stable.
4. Click Done.